As regular CFZ-watchers will know, for some time Corinna has been doing a column for Animals & Men and a regular segment on On The Track... particularly about out-of-place birds and rare vagrants. There seem to be more and more bird stories from all over the world hitting the news these days so, to make room for them all - and to give them all equal and worthy coverage - she has set up this new blog to cover all things feathery and Fortean.

Thursday, 28 February 2013

February 2013. Researchers in Bulgaria
have taken the largest ever catch of Endangered red-breasted geese and fitted
satellite tracking devices in a bid to unlock one of the biggest mysteries of
the natural world.

red-breasted goose (Wikipedia)

Just over ten years ago, more than 50,000 of the small,
brightly coloured geese seemingly disappeared from their wintering grounds
along the Black Sea coast in Bulgaria,
Romania and Ukraine.

Relocated or exterminated?
Coordinated international counts have not since recorded a significant
increase, leaving scientists speculating whether the missing geese - half the
world population - have relocated to unknown sites in southwest Asia or fallen foul of hunting, development and changes
in farming.

Teams from the Wildfowl
& Wetlands Trust (WWT) and the Bulgarian Society for the Protection
of Birds (BSPB) caught 91 red-breasted geese and fitted 11 tags to follow the
birds' individual movements along their 6,000 km migration to breeding grounds
in Arctic Russia.

But conservationists working to save the red-breasted
goose are being realistic about the chances of rediscovering the ‘lost'
population. The data gathered will also help conservationists work with
farmers, planners and developers in Bulgaria.

Peter Cranswick, Head of Species Recovery at WWT, has
been at the heart of the international effort to catch and tag the geese. He
said:

50% of the world's population disappeared
"Almost overnight, we were unable to account for around half the world's
red-breasted geese. The reasons are still unclear and we are tracking these
individual birds to find out more.

"The data we get will be invaluable to our work with
local communities in Bulgaria
- the farmers, shooters and landowners - to work out how we support the
remaining geese, while still meeting their needs. It is also possible that, as
the climate has changed, some birds have started to winter further east. We
hope our tagged birds will reveal as yet unknown sites, so we can assess their
importance and - if necessary - ensure their protection."

The project ‘Safe Ground for Redbreasts' is funded the
contribution of the LIFE financial instrument of the European Community.

A game keeper set out to protect his pheasants by trapping
some of Britain's
rarest birds of prey using illegal cages baited with live pigeons, a court
heard yesterday.

Shaun Allanson, 37, subsidised his income from working on
the BlansbyPark
near Pickering, North
Yorkshire, by breeding and selling game birds to shooting parties.

Goshawks, so rare they were once declared extinct, were a
known predator on the estate but protected by the Wildlife and Countryside Act.

Natural England
officer Justine Clark was carrying out a survey at BlansbyPark
when she stumbled across one of Allanson's illegal cages, the court heard.

It was inside a pheasant pen on the estate which was
surrounded by a six foot high electric fence, Scarborough Magistrates were
told. She found a wire cage "letter box trap" - with a slot just big
enough for a bird to get in but not out again.

"Inside was a buzzard eating what appeared to be a
freshly killed pigeon," said Sarah Tyrer, prosecuting for the CPS.
"Her immediate thought was that this was an illegal trap. Looking inside
she could see food, water, and a perch.

"She released the buzzard and reported the matter to
police."

In follow up visits by police, a pigeon skull was found in
the bottom of the cage, and a second small trap was discovered hidden in the
pen 100ft from the bigger one.

The officer also arranged logs in front of the gate to the
pen and when he returned they had been rearranged, showing someone had been
inside again.

The court heard such cages were not illegal but were only
supposed to be used for catching crows at certain times and not baited with
live pigeons.

The high-speed rail line will threaten the survival of
rare willow tits, conservationists warned last week.

Cheshire Wildlife Trust says the tiny species and other
woodland birds are in danger because their habitat is close to the proposed
route of the high-speed rail trains.

The £32billion line will pass ancient forests, wetlands
and patches of mosses, including some areas that are protected by law because
of their scientific value.

They include the Lightshaw Meadows nature reserve near Wigan, a haven for rare birds including willow tits. It
is feared bats, water voles, newts and other birds including the rare black
redstart, could also be at risk.

willow tit (Wikipedia)

Charlotte Harris, director of conservation at Cheshire
Wildlife Trust, said: “It’s clear the government sees high-speed rail as the
best deal for the north-west economy, but it’s our job to ensure we get the
best deal for wildlife too.”

Up to 11 wildlife sites will be within a 100 metre
corridor of the line in the north
west, and another 35 are just a kilometre away.

The trust says four sites of special scientific interest
are also close to the line, including Holcroft Moss, a wetland reserve near
Glazebrook, Warrington.

It says the affected local wildlife sites include ancient
woodlands containing trees more than 400 years old.

In a letter to the U.S. Department of Interior, American
Bird Conservancy (ABC) called on the agency to suspend further consideration of
a revised rule that would weaken protections provided to eagles pursuant to the
Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, by allowing private companies to apply
for an unprecedented 30-year permit to kill these iconic species.

ABC, one of the nation’s leading bird conservation groups,
instead called for the rule to be shelved until Sally Jewell, President Obama’s
nominee for Secretary of Interior, has had time to fully review the proposal
and evaluate its potential long-term impacts on eagle populations.

“The public places a high value on both Bald and Golden
Eagles, two species that have inspired awe, pride, and patriotism in America’s
citizens for generations. The Bald Eagle is America’s national symbol and was
only removed from the endangered species list in 2007. Thus, this important and
highly controversial decision should not be made without the full participation
and careful consideration of the new Secretary of the Interior,” said Darin
Schroeder, ABC’s vice president of Conservation Advocacy.

The new, far weaker, version of the eagle protection rule
was drafted after requests from the wind energy industry, and represents a
curious reversal of a FWS decision in 2009. At that time the USFWS wrote, “…the
rule limits permit tenure to five years or less because factors may change over
a longer period of time such that a take authorized much earlier would later be
incompatible with the preservation of the Bald Eagle or the Golden Eagle.”

February 2013. Malcolm Calvert photographed this
shearwater off the coast of Costa Rica in January 2013. He has asked Wildlife
Extra to help identify this bird, so we are turning this over to our readers.
If you can help Malcolm, please leave a note below or email us with your
thoughts.

PHOTO OF A SHEARWATER OFF COST RICA BY MALCOLM
CALVERT - BUT WHICH SHEARWATER IS IT? Please help identify this bird

For more than 35 years, Arizona's Bald Eagle Nestwatch Program has contributed
to the tremendous growth of the state’s bald eagle population and helped save
the lives of more than 60 eagle nestlings.

This year's nestwatchers begin their four-month tours of duty this week,
watching 14 breeding areas, most along the Salt and Verde rivers in national
forests, on Native American lands, and in Maricopa County parks. They collect
data about the eagles' behavior, educate the public, and notify rescuers of any
life-threatening situations for the birds.

So far in 2013, three new breeding areas have been documented bringing Arizona
to a record 68 bald eagle breeding areas throughout the state.

The department's bald eagle conservation program is supported by the Heritage
Fund, a 1990 voter-passed initiative that provides funding for wildlife
conservation and education from Arizona lottery dollars. The
nationally-recognized nestwatch program began in 1978 as a weekend volunteer
effort by the U.S. Forest Service and Maricopa Audubon to help ensure the
continued success of bald eagle breeding. Today, 26 government, private
organizations and tribes are involved with the program to monitor bald eagle
breeding areas that are under heavy pressure from human recreational
activities.

Tuesday, 26 February 2013

No one ever talks about survival of
the nicest out there in the wild, and there's a reason for that. We can
only assume that animal jerks like this grabby little bird will probably
live forever. Just look at that sweet little kangaroo just peacefully
eating a banana (or femur or whatever) and presumably humming Australian folk
songs in his head, oblivious to the cunning bird swooping in from behind. The
bird comes in quick as a flash and makes his getaway, leaving the kangaroo to
look much like we do when our fingers make it to the bottom of the Dorito bag
earlier than we intended. Next time keep your treats in your pouch,
kangaroo. Haven't had enough of jerky animals for one day? Click
through the gallery above to see even more.

The $1 million partnership between DOC and Air
New Zealand to bring some of our most threatened birds back to our acclaimed
Great Walks track network is a fantastic example of what can be achieved when
business gets involved in conservation, says Minister of Conservation Dr Nick
Smith.

“This is an inspiring partnership that benefits both conservation and tourism.
It will create predator free zones for some of our most threatened birds while
adding to the visitor experience on our most famous Great Walks,” says Dr
Smith.

“This Bluegreen approach of finding environmentally responsible business
partners to help fund conservation helps us do more in tight financial times.
The benefits for conservation are more than just the $1 million, as Air New
Zealand’s marketing muscles also helps us raise the profile of these threatened
iconic birds.

“This is not just about international tourists. This is about New Zealanders
being able to see birds like kiwi, whio, takahe and kokako in their natural
habitat.

“Air New Zealand is showing real leadership and innovation with this initiative
and I am encouraging DOC to continue exploring other partnerships that will
help the conservation cause.”

"Some farmers, if they had this
concentration of geese, will put out the shotguns and use the sound to distract
them," said Brent Tadman, who manages the 9,200-acre (3,700-hectare)
Conservation Farms and Ranches on the island.

A pair of sandhill cranes forage on a farm in Staten Island, California.

TNC hopes bird-friendly practices developed and
tested on Staten Island will set an example for other farmers for how they can
keep their land productive and profitable—while creating habitat for birds
traveling along the Pacific Flyway, one of four primary migratory routes in
North America.

One special visitor's planned arrival to Fire
Island is creating a pressing deadline for the cleanup of tons of rotting wood,
sheet rock, old refrigerators and other Superstorm Sandy debris from the
popular vacation destination east of New York City.

Contractor crews are scrambling to get the trash
removed by the end of March, before truck access is severely restricted to
protect the nesting areas of the endangered bird species known as the piping
plover.

"The deadline has everyone's
attention," said Suzy Goldhirsch, president of the Fire Island
Association, which represents businesses and homeowners on the 32-mile-long
barrier island south of Long Island.

She said most homeowners do not begrudge laws
protecting the plover, a compact, pale shorebird with coloring that makes it
all but vanish against the open sand flats where it nests.

But if officials can't get the cleanup done by
the deadline, they will have to haul away the estimated 82,500 cubic yards of
trash by barge, which will be much more expensive and take longer.

That could push the cleanup closer to the
Memorial Day-to-Labor Day tourist season, when the population of Fire Island
swells from 300 to 75,000.

Access to the beachfront by vehicle will be
banned until after September, according to environmentalists.

Monday, 25 February 2013

Reddit user gorbok posted a photo his friend Trevor Maltby took upon returning to his car after leaving it at the Cairns International Airport in Australia for six days while away on business. The photo, taken on Feb. 19, features a small bird, a nest and tiny eggs, all perilously perched atop the windshield wiper blade of an Audi hatchback.

Maltby told us about the discovery. "At first I thought it was just trying to 'blend in,' then I noticed it looked like it was trying to make a nest. As I got closer it appeared it was not about to fly away. I called over a colleague who had just arrived on the same flight and got him to come have a look. ... I took a picture of it sitting there, then we both tried to give it a bit of a hurry up—we could basically pet it if we wanted too— and my colleague put his hand right up to it's face, and that's when it raised its wings and exposed those eggs."

Maltby spent an hour on the phone with wildlife officials. They confirmed that the bird was a native Peaceful Dove. "They are known for nesting in awkward places," Maltby said. He was told he could either ask somebody to come down and "relocate the nest" or he could leave the car there and wait for the eggs to hatch.

Being the good guy that he is, Maltby offered to leave his car and got a ride home. "The next day I got a call from the airport to say that the wildlife officials had come and removed the nest as its location was deemed to be far from ideal, and that I could come and collect my car. The eggs have been taken to an incubator and the mother was unable to be caught and taken with them, though they figured she would probably lay again in the very near future."

These Swedish reporters didn’t know quite what they were in for when they stopped along an old country road to shoot a quick segment. A very aggressive bird is out to make sure that they know this is his turf and that humans are not necessarily welcome. Watch now and find out who will win in this battle of wills.

Photos courtesy of Carol Griswold. A Siberian
Accentor — a small bird with a brown-streaked back and yellowish eyebrows and
underparts — showed up in Seward late last month.

Wikipedia

Redoubt Reporter

While lightning rarely strikes the same spot
twice, an equally unusual occurrence has been happening on the Kenai Peninsula
this winter as not just one, but two more rare bird sightings have taken place
in a winter already marked by a number of odd avian identifications.

A Siberian Accentor — a small bird with a
brown-streaked back and yellowish eyebrows and underparts — showed up in Seward
late last month, while several small groups of bramblings — long-winged,
long-tailed birds with orange to their breasts and shoulders — have been seen
in not just Seward, but several other locations, since their November arrival.

“The Siberian Accentor is really exciting. The
last observation of one was in Hope back about 20 years ago, so this is a big
deal,” said Ken Tarbox, of the Keen Eye Birders, a retired Alaska Department of
Fish and Game biologist, and one of the organizers of the Kenai Peninsula
Wildlife Viewing Trail Guide.

Seward birders Kit and Janet Durnil first
spotted the Siberian Accentor on Jan. 22. They knew they had never seen a bird
with a mask like the accentor, but they weren’t entirely sure what they were
seeing. They called Carol Griswold, an avid Seward birder who leads bird-watching
trips to see unusual species, such as this.

Griswold said that the bird has been a little
tricky to spot. It’s been moving a bit and also traveling with other birds,
including varied thrush and fox, golden-crowned, white-crowned and song
sparrows.

Feb. 20, 2013 — A male fairy-wren's low
pitch song indicates body size, a new international study has shown. The study
led by University of Melbourne researcher Dr Michelle Hall, is the first to
show that the larger the male fairy wren, the lower the pitch of his song.

"This is the first time we have been able
to show that song pitch indicates body size in song birds," said Dr Hall
from the University's Department of Zoology.

The study, which began when Dr Hall was at the
Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Germany, has been published February 20
in the journal PLOS ONE.

Reliable communication about body size between
animals is particularly important when communicating with mates or rivals. For
example the bigger the rival is, the more likely it is to win in a fight so a
song pitch indicating a large size may deter rivals.

"Surprisingly, there is very little
evidence that the pitch of calls indicates body size differences within
species, except in frogs," she said.

"In birds in particular, there has been no
evidence that the pitch of songs indicated the size of the singer until
now."

Sunday, 24 February 2013

February 2013. Having worked for many years as a
builder, Duncan McCutchan was frustrated by the lack of opportunities to
incorporate nesting sites into housing developments which are increasingly
happening on green sites.

So he decided to do something himself, and he started to build nesting sites
into walls. He has now built on his knowledge and experience to produce nesting
boxes which are designed to be incorporated into buildings.

The boxes are designed so that the fronts can be
easily removed so that they can be cleaned out and monitored. The boxes,
suitable for birds and bats, are unique and have the potential to benefit many
British species of birds and bats. These boxes provide permanent nesting and
roosting sites and will last the lifespan of the building; they are also more
predator proof and weather resistant than traditional wooden boxes.

Wildlife Extra would like to see the day when it
is compulsory to include something like this in all new build houses.

$85,000 in restitution to be managed, as it
becomes available, by the International Crane Foundation to further Whooping
Crane conservation

February 2013. The International Crane
Foundation (ICF) is very pleased and relieved that an appropriate sentence was
issued to the man who shot an adult male Whooping crane in South Dakota last
April. The migrating adult crane was one of fewer than 300 individuals
remaining in the Aransas/Wood Buffalo population, the only self-sustaining wild
population of Whooping cranes in the world.

Sentence
Jeff Blachford, 26, was given a sentence that includes $85,000 in restitution
(Compensation), 2 years probation, confiscation of his hunting rifle, and
removal of his hunting and trapping rights anywhere in the U.S. for 2 years.
Read full sentencing details here.

"Today, hunters and other citizens are
receiving a clear message that there is a real price to shooting an endangered
species," notes Dr. Richard Beilfuss, President & CEO of the
International Crane Foundation.

Because of ICF's leadership and experience in
crane conservation, the USFWS has decided that the restitution money, as it
becomes available, will be managed by ICF to further Whooping crane
conservation. To address the continued threat of illegal shooting to the
recovery of Whooping crane populations, ICF and our partners are expanding
their educational outreach to students, hunters and the general public across
the Whooping cranes' range. The goal is to increase awareness, understanding
and appreciation for these natural treasures.

Feb. 21, 2013 — Common swifts climb to
altitudes of up to 2.5 km both at dawn and dusk. This unexpected behaviour was
discovered by geo-ecologist Dr Adriaan Dokter of the University of Amsterdam's
(UvA) Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics (IBED) together with
colleagues from the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI), the
Royal Netherlands Air Force and Lund University.

The research results were published as a
featured article in the March issue of the scientific journal Animal
Behaviour.

In the summer, swifts make their presence felt
in the city, especially because of the screaming sound they make. These common
urban birds appear to have unusual movement patterns. Besides a short breeding
period under urban roofing tiles, these birds spend all year on the wing:
foraging, mating and even sleeping are all performed in flight. Using a novel
radar technique, Dokter and his colleagues studied the nocturnal flight
behaviour of the common swift with the assistance of a weather radar belonging
to the KNMI.

Dokter explains: 'We always assumed that common
swifts ascended in the evening as part of their sleeping cycle. However, now
that we have observed the bird perform ascents at both the start and the end of
night-time periods, this interpretation seems to be incorrect. The ascents must
have a different function, with the birds making use of the unique
opportunities offered by the twilight period.'

A Yukon biologist says ptarmigan and gyrfalcon
populations could be in decline across Canada's northwestern Yukon territory.
Dave Mossop says the fluctuations in these two "key" species could be
a sign of greater trouble across the food chain.

Robert Massolini photo

Both populations usually peak in a 10-year cycle
but recent bird surveys do not indicate a peak as expected. Mossop says the
unexpected change in the cycle could be a result of climate change or other
factors.

"For the last cycle yes, it declined, for
reasons that we don't understand," says Mossop. "But the great hope
is that things will re-establish themselves. The 10-year cycle in the boreal
system is one of the most obvious things that's happening, and for some reason
it faltered. That's kind of where we are now."

Mossop says gyrfalcons depend on ptarmigan as a
source of food and that the predatory birds will stop breeding when there
aren't enough ptarmigan to eat.

He says the Yukon Research Centre has access to
a database on arctic birds which dates 50 years. Mossup says tracking willow
ptarmigan and gyrfalcons is important because the birds are respectively at the
bottom and top of the food chain.

"A lot of the research went into
understanding the amazing intricacies between these two species," he says.
"They evolved together and depend on each other. But recently as everybody
knows the tundra systems are in harm's way and things are changing. In
particular at the top of the food chain because the gyrfalcon is dependent on
the whole thing working properly. What we're seeing is a change in the birds'
ability to maintain their populations."

Scientists recently counted gyrfalcon eggs in
the Ogilve Mountains in central Yukon as part of a falcon survey.

Mossup says the predators are relatively easy to
monitor because they build nests in the same place year after year.

A lost penguin dubbed Happy Feet junior has
died, despite intensive efforts by New Zealand vets to save him.

A penguin dubbed Happy Feet junior that washed
up in New Zealand 2000 kilometres from his home has died despite intensive
efforts to save him, Wellington Zoo said on Friday.

A veterinary team spent five days caring for the
bird, a juvenile royal penguin which had drifted far from a breeding colony in
sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island after spending an estimated 12 months at sea.

But the zoo's chief vet, Lisa Argilla, said the
penguin died overnight as malnutrition and kidney failure took their toll.

"As the penguin arrived nearly three
kilograms underweight, it had absolutely no reserves and subsequently we
suspect that this led to multiple organ failure, following the kidney failure
diagnosed on its arrival," she said.

"Wildlife medicine is a very challenging field
and though we did the best we could, sadly the penguin didn't survive."

The bird's discovery revived memories of the
original Happy Feet, an emperor penguin that was found stranded near Wellington
in June 2011, attracting worldwide interest during an eight-week recuperation
at the zoo.

A New Zealand research ship eventually released
the penguin into the Southern Ocean after it received visits from celebrities
such as Stephen Fry and best wishes from New Zealand Prime Minister John Key.

However, a tracking device attached to the bird
stopped transmitting after a few days, sparking fears it had been eaten by a
shark.

A significant legal precedent was set last week
in Canada that could have ripple effects worldwide. A Canadian judge has
recognized in a ruling the need for building owners to take action to reduce
migratory bird deaths from lethal collisions with the highly reflective windows
of office buildings.

“This is a significant development in an
increasingly serious issue that is gaining more attention worldwide – the
impact of man-made structures on wildlife, especially birds, and the need to
modify existing buildings, as well as incorporating bird-friendly design into
new construction,” said Dr. Christine Sheppard, Bird Collisions Campaign
Manager for American Bird Conservancy, one of the leading U.S. bird
conservation organizations and the only one in the U.S. with a national bird
collisions program.

Cadillac Fairview, one of Canada’s largest
commercial property owners and managers, was charged with violating the
Environmental Protection Act (EPA) and the federal Species at Risk Act (SARA).
In a ruling, Judge Melvyn Green of the Ontario Court of Justice found that
hundreds of birds, including threatened species, had been injured and killed at
the company’s Yonge Corporate Centre, consisting of three office buildings in
Toronto, during the 2010 spring and fall migrations. Judge Green ruled that
both the EPA and SARA are properly interpreted to prohibit the emission
(intentional or unintentional) of reflected light where that reflection causes
the death or injury of birds.

While the Toronto court acquitted Cadillac
Fairview and related companies of the charges, that verdict was handed down
only as a consequence to the corporate steps being taken to address the
problem. The company began investigating window films as a solution after Ecojustice
and Ontario Nature laid similar charges against a different building owner, and
subsequently installed window films on the most lethal side of their complex at
a cost of over $100,000. The company also committed to retrofitting the
remainder of the complex.

Feb. 21, 2013 — From Antarctica to
Afghanistan, bird watchers from 103 countries made history in the first global
Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC), February 15-18, 2013. In the largest
worldwide bird count ever, bird watchers set new records, counting more than
25.5 million birds on 120,000+ checklists in four days -- and recording 3,144
species, nearly one-third of the world's total bird species. The data will
continue to flow in until March 1.

Building on the success of the GBBC in the
United States and Canada for the past 15 years, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology,
Audubon, and Bird Studies Canada opened the count to the rest of the world for
the first time this year, powered by eBird, a system that enables people to
report birds globally in real-time and explore the results online. Bird
watchers are invited to keep counting every day of the year at www.eBird.org.

Cornell Lab director Dr. John Fitzpatrick says:
"This is a milestone for citizen science in so many respects -- number of
species, diversity of countries involved, total participants, and number of
individual birds recorded. We hope this is just the start of something far
larger, engaging the whole world in creating a detailed annual snapshot of how
all our planet's birds are faring as the years go by."

Audubon Chief Scientist Gary Langham:
"People who care about birds can change the world," said Audubon
chief scientist Gary Langham. "That's why this year's record-setting
global participation is so exciting. Technology has made it possible for people
everywhere to unite around a shared love of birds and a commitment to
protecting them."